Agriculture

Berries are rich sources of nutrients that can offer health benefits to consumers. Short growing season and shelf life are limit factors and a large amount of fresh berries have to be processed. Freeze drying is a rapid and low-temperature technique that can maximally retain the nutritional values and flavors of berry products. The influence of freeze drying on nutritional values of berries is not fully characterized yet. The objective of this research is to investigate the correlation of manufacturing conditions with nutritional values of the finial berry products.

Most economically important traits associated with lactation and reproduction in pigs are either less heritable, sex-limited, expressed later in life, or difficult to measure on a routine basis. Genomic predictions using single step best linear unbiased prediction (SSBLUP) methodologies, which utilizes information on phenotypes, pedigree and markers from genotyped and non-genotyped animals simultaneously, is an alternative to phenotype and pedigree based (BLUP) methods.

Like humans and other animals, plants also get sick, exhibit disease symptoms, and even die. Over the past 100 years, farmers have heavily relied upon chemical fertilizers and pesticides in order to increase crop productivity and quality. However, the environmental pollution caused by excessive use and misuse of agrochemicals has led to considerable changes in peopleâs attitudes towards the use of pesticides in agriculture.

The purpose of this research is to examine the food consumption pattern in Revelstoke, British Columbia. Through employing a three-stage action research approach â (i) the food receipt study, (ii) the social media intervention (SMI) on healthy eating and healthy cooking, and (iii) the food consumption depth interview, this study seeks to capture residentsâ food consumption patterns and to develop creative recommendations to practitioners, policy-makers and academic researchers regarding rural food consumption patterns and food security.

Whey proteins in milk are detrimental to the rennet-induced coagulation of milk. In this project, we will use microfiltration membrane technique to concentrate the milk and to remove whey proteins. A process called diafiltration (DF) will also be used to further remove whey proteins by adding water to the MF concentrated milk and then filtered. MF and MF-DF milk have different whey protein contents and ionic concentration, which will change the coagulation behaviour of milk.

Feed restriction in gestating sows is required to prevent excessive body weight gain and the associated negative consequences on lactation, locomotion, farrowing, and feed intake during lactation. Aggression and stereotypies associated with restricted feeding become a welfare and production concern when the sows are housed in groups.

The agriculture industry is a labour intensive industry. Using a reliable method of plant monitoring can greatly help farmers to reduce their labours and consequently their production costs. Creating an accurate 3-D model of each plant or vegetable provides farmers with more information about the growth stage of the plant which helps them to make smarter decisions for irrigation and harvesting. There are various 3-D technologies available in the market.

Calves in dairy production systems have been traditionally fed low amounts of milk to encourage solid feed intake which is thought to minimize stress during weaning. It is unclear how feeding an elevated amount of milk pre-weaning and the digestibility of the solid feed has on gut health and function in dairy calves â which is of great interest to Cargill Animal Nutrition Canada. Therefore the objective of this project is to determine how plane of milk nutrition and starch digestion in solid feed impact dairy calf gut development and health during weaning. TO BE CONT'D

The B vitamin requirements of cattle were traditionally satisfied via rumen microbial synthesis. However, the B vitamin demands of the modern high producing dairy cow now exceed the synthesis rate by rumen microbes, leading to sub-optimal milk production and efficiency. An increased understanding of dietary factors driving ruminal synthesis and use of B vitamins will help identify when supplementation will benefit the cow. Although B vitamin kinetics in the dairy cow have not previously been modelled, data on concentrations and flows are available from extant sources.

The efficient monitoring of soil and crop parameters is essential for crop stress evaluation and yield forecast in agriculture, yet most remote sensing studies focus on regional-scale soil and crop parameters estimation using satellite data. Satellite remote sensing is difficult to obtain both high spatial and temporal resolution data with a low-cost in field-scale. Currently, UAV-based remote sensing is a flexible and reliable approach could provide proper data for intra-field monitoring.